Forced Play for Libby (Men of Baseball #3) Read online

  The next week, I took Pete to their house for dinner. Then, just days later, he was proposing. I was stupid to think that my father wasn’t involved with the engagement, or maybe I was just hopefully ignorant and blind. He swore it was all Pete and, like a fool, I believed him.

  During our honeymoon, Pete’s change in demeanor was evident. Like a bullhorn blasting in my face, it was so damn obvious that my father had been somehow involved.

  I had hope that I could, and would, be able to turn us around. That Pete would see how wonderful I was. That we would go back to those two kids who found passion within each other. That we would fall in love and live some stupid fairytale life. It was all bullshit.

  The day we arrived back home from our honeymoon, Pete informed me that this marriage was for appearances only. After a week of sun, and so much sex, I was having a hard time walking. We wouldn’t be fucking again, and we wouldn’t be required to stay faithful to each other either.

  Our relationship was for the tabloids only.

  Nothing more.

  A farce.

  That was the first time I contemplated self-harm.

  I had never thought of hurting myself before, but I had the sudden urge to end my pathetic existence.

  I hated myself.

  I hated Pete.

  I hated everything.

  I close my eyes, trying to shake off the bad memories as I slide into my little red sports car. It was a birthday gift from my father this last year. He decided I needed a new car, a brand new Stingray Corvette, so that was what he had delivered. Pete rolled his eyes when the dealership dropped it off—his only reaction. I hated the car. It wasn’t me. I wanted something sleek and dark, like a black sedan, a BMW or Mercedes even; but I would never have anything but a Chevrolet, ever. My father would never hear of it. I don’t turn on the radio as I drive in silence toward my destination.

  Jackson and Maggie’s apartment is in a gorgeous brownstone building in the middle of the city, and I love their views. The door flings open and Maggie’s little blonde body wraps around mine in a huge hug as she drags me inside. I look up to see that everybody else has already arrived. Jarrod and Amalie, along with their beautiful baby boy, clinging to Jarrod’s neck. Victoria and Carlos, with their little girl running around their feet and their brand new baby nestled in Victoria’s arms. They are all here to greet me with a big smile. I hate myself for being so fake. I want to scream, but instead, I smile widely in return.

  “Pete had a prior engagement and he couldn’t make it, but he’s very sorry,” I lie. I notice Amalie’s brows furrow. She always looks at me curiously and I feel as though she can see through all of my lies, but she never says anything.

  “Oh, that’s all right. This was kind of last minute, anyway,” Maggie says softly. I smile at her. Maggie is beautiful, and now that she’s happy with Jackson, she is radiant. I am so envious of her—of all my friends, really.

  “I can’t hold it in. I’m pregnant,” Maggie screams. Everybody gasps, then they all start talking wildly as congratulations are being given to both Maggie and Jackson.

  I suck in a breath and try to keep the look of despair off of my face. I will never have that—a family, a baby. I shake my head, then get my shit together and congratulate my friend. She deserves it; she deserves everything good that could happen to her after her horrible marriage to Sammy.

  We drink, we eat, and we celebrate, but I can’t get past the looks Amalie and Maggie have been giving me off and on throughout the evening. They see more than I want them to—always have.

  I pick up my phone and pray for Pete to text me, to contact me in anyway whatsoever. I do have a new message, but it’s the same message I’ve been receiving for months. It’s cryptic and it confuses me.

  The same sentence every single time – Pete doesn’t love you. He loves me, bitch.

  I look up and notice that Amalie is staring at me, so I arch my brow questioningly. She opens her mouth but promptly shuts it, turning to talk to somebody else.

  I leave early, wishing to avoid the whole group. When I arrive home, Pete is sitting on the couch watching television in his boxers. I whimper under my breath at the sight of him. He truly is gorgeous. I will never get tired of looking at him, even if it hurts my heart.

  Both of his arms are now covered in colorful tattoos and they even curl up and around his neck and chest. When we first met, his arms were spattered with colorful ink, but now he’s a beautiful masterpiece. He has big diamond earrings in each ear and his faux hawk is his natural light brown, instead of the dyed black mop he sported in college. It's always messy and always delicious.

  Pete’s body is ripped from hours at the gym and on the field; his thighs are thick and corded with muscle. I don’t get to look at him without clothes very often, so I drink in the sight for a few moments. I hate myself a little more for lusting after the asshole.

  “Jackson and Maggie are going to have a baby,” I announce as I walk into the room. He doesn’t flinch or even look my way. I dig my fingernails into my palms, a nasty habit I have formed since my wedding night.

  “Please, say something,” I urge softly. Pete looks at me, his moss green eyes dead of all emotion. It’s a look I am supremely aware of because it is the only way he looks at me anymore; or, as I like to call it, looking through me.

  “Good for them,” he says flatly. I blink, my own eyes wet with unshed tears.

  “Don’t you want children, Pete? All of our friends are having babies and we don’t even…” I let my words trail off because I can’t finish the sentence.

  “Fuck, no. Not with you,” he spits. I take a step back. He is so angry, so bitter, and I don’t understand why. I’ve asked him a million times and he won’t tell me.

  “I would like a baby with you, Pete. Our baby would be beautiful,” I try to say calmly, but inside I am being ripped apart.

  “Your family doesn’t have enough money to shove at me that would make me want to put my cock anywhere near you again, let alone make another person like you,” he barks out. I suck in a breath and try to look anywhere else, but his gorgeous green eyes leave me completely frozen in my spot.

  “Why are you being so heartless, Pete?” I ask as tears spill down my cheeks.

  “Because I fucking hate you, Elizabeth.”

  I turn and run into my bedroom, shutting and locking the door behind me before I collapse onto the floor and cry. In all of my years with Pete and his venom, never has he spoken to me so harshly. Never has he told me that he hates me. They weren’t just empty words, flat emotionless words. I felt his hate, it was a living, breathing thing and it was aimed right at me.

  Eventually, I gather myself from the floor and take my sleeping pills so that I can fall asleep. It takes a while, but eventually my mind slides into that space of haze that I love; that numbing haze where I forget just how fucked up my life truly is, before I fall asleep.

  I DON’T FEEL LIKE I am being cruel when I tell Libby that I hate her. I do hate her. If she doesn’t know why, then she’s a bigger idiot than I ever thought possible. Still, it twists my gut to see tears stream down her beautiful face—and she is beautiful. She is still the most beautiful woman I have ever laid eyes on. Sometimes it hurts just to look at her. It can be excruciating to know that I can’t touch her. I remember how fucking hot she burned under my touch. I still remember how she felt beneath my fingers and body as if it were only yesterday.

  I met Libby in college, seven years ago. I was some poor punk, from the wrong side of town, at a fancy as shit school—on a baseball scholarship. When I saw her from across the room at that shitty frat party, she took my breath away.

  Libby was gorgeous; long dark hair and bright blue eyes, a killer body, and a look of sweet innocence that tempted the bad boy inside of me. I wanted her, but not just for a night; no, I wanted to keep her. It should have scared me shitless, but it didn’t. I had never wanted a woman like I wanted her.

  I took her innocence the night we met, and I kn
ew she had to be mine forever. No way was I going to let another man inside of her. She was all mine. I fucking owned her body—or at least, that was how I felt then. After we spent that first night together, I asked her out on a real date.

  That first date, it was practically written in fucking stone—she was going to be mine forever.

  I wanted to do things the right way with her. She was a good girl and I knew she felt guilty for giving herself to me. She had to have. No girl waits until she’s twenty years old to have sex if she wasn’t saving herself for one reason or another. A week later, I was shocked as shit when she asked me to meet her family. She seemed nervous and scared at the concept.

  Our second official date, I met her family. She was pretty anxious and worried, but I wasn’t; not until we pulled up in front of her parent’s mansion. Libby came from money. Not just a little money, but serious, old as shit money. I knew right then and there that her parents would despise me. I was going places, but I would never be good enough or have enough for her.

  The awkward dinner was bad, but they were all relatively nice – to my face, at least. Then her father called me into his office the next day. I walked in and it smelled like whiskey, cigars, and leather. My palms were sweaty because I knew what he wanted. He didn’t want me anywhere near the blue blood that ran through his daughter’s veins.

  “You want my Elizabeth, son?” He asked, his brow arching.

  I sat down in the soft leather chair and my eyes clashed with his bright green ones. I wondered where Libby’s vibrant blue eyes came from; it seemed she was completely different from her own parents, in looks and in personality.

  “I like her very much, sir,” I admitted. He snorted.

  “I have tried to get boys of her caliber and breeding to date her, but they don’t want her. They say she’s frigid, uptight, no fun, and a bitch. However, she fucked you, so I suppose she isn’t all that frigid or picky. I fear I’ll never marry the girl off, especially now that she’s slummed it with the likes of you,” he sneered.

  I looked around in surprise, thinking this had to be a joke. Libby was sweet —quiet, but sweet. When she smiled at me, I felt ten feet tall. This jackass was her father and I couldn’t believe he was talking about her this way.

  “Libby is very beautiful, sir. I would question the men you’re trying to set her up with,” I said, ignoring his less than flattering comments. He chuckled at my words, shaking his head.

  “Elizabeth is a hassle. She doesn’t put herself out there for the boys in the club, and unless I sweeten the pot, she’ll be living here after college. That just won’t do. She’s a burden, really, and you’re the first boy she’s brought around, so I have a proposal.”

  I couldn’t believe he was saying these things about his own daughter. It made my stomach roil, but he continued.

  “Marry her, keep her for ten years, then divorce her if you want. I did some research on you. You want to play ball? I have it on good account a few pro teams have been eyeing you. Play for the Yankees, they’ll take you. It’s all you’ve dreamed of, son; money, baseball, and a wife at home to make that image pristine. Fuck who you want, just don’t get caught, and then scrape the girl off in ten years,” he suggested, making me gape. He was offering me my dream in a sweet little package, but it felt dirty.

  I felt dirty.

  “I can’t,” I said.

  I wanted to earn my future. I had come this far on my own and I wanted to prove to myself that I could do it all.

  “Don’t be stupid, son. Elizabeth wants you, I can tell, and you want to play ball. It’s a win-win,” he waved his hand like it was all a no-brainer, no big deal. It made me angry, so angry, and my head was swimming with his words.

  Could I accept his offer?

  Could I marry Libby just to play pro-ball?

  My dreams were at the tips of my fingers, but it felt so wrong.

  “I’ll just sell her off to someone else if you don’t accept.” He put that nail in the coffin and hammered down. I felt my body shake. He would sell her like cattle.

  I felt like we were back in the fifteen hundreds and I needed a goat and three sheep to make the deal concrete. I accepted anyway. My gut hated me. I went home and puked for what seemed like hours, afterward.

  I wasn’t the same after I signed the dotted line. The way I looked at Libby wasn’t the same. Resentment and anger filled my body, more and more, with each passing day. It was all directed toward Libby. It was all her fault I felt that way.

  Libby was so excited when I proposed, which I didn’t do very romantically. I just slid the ring her father threw at me on her finger and said, let’s get married. She didn’t seem to care how I asked, she was just happy I asked. Excited, even. It was at that point that I wondered if she had pressed her father into convincing me to marry her.

  Was it all a lie, a farce, so that little Elizabeth could get what she wanted?

  At that moment, I decided it didn’t matter. I would marry her. The contracts I signed were binding, but I would never be her fucking husband. She and her family could go fuck themselves. I didn’t have to be nice to her. I sure as fuck didn’t have to sleep with her and pretend that I was the happy doting husband behind closed doors. Her ten years of being my wife wouldn’t be easy, but she would just have to suck it up.

  In the beginning, Libby tried and it made me curious. Why would she learn to cook and clean when I made more than enough to hire chefs and maids? Not to mention her trust fund could support a small country. I tried to ignore all of the domestic things that she did. I figured when I didn’t react that she would turn into the princess she was raised to be and hire help. After seven years, she is still doing all of the cooking, cleaning and laundry. I do not understand it.

  Libby changed physically before my eyes, as well. I watched as her once fuller, curvy, figure dwindled to the extremely thin woman she now is. Her chest inflated about a year after our marriage. At first, she would try to flaunt her new tits in front of me at home, but she always covered up in public, as if she was embarrassed of the attention they brought her from other people. Then, when I showed the new body parts zero attention she covered them up at home too.

  I didn’t understand why she was so thin or why she had her tits done. She looked great the day I married her—not that I ever told her. I try to keep our communication to a minimum. I wouldn’t have changed a thing about her, though. While she has changed, Libby is still gorgeous. Her dark hair is long and beautiful; her smaller frame and larger chest aren't what I would have liked her to do to herself, but she still takes my breath away on a daily basis.

  I try to forget about the woman crying in her bedroom, something she does almost nightly, and direct my attention back to the television. I’m watching a cop drama, but I can't concentrate. There was something different about the haunting blue eyes that had just practically begged me for a baby tonight.

  I haven't fucked my own wife since the day we came back from our honeymoon. That being said, she still stood in front of me, begging for a baby like I would ever bring a kid into this fucked up life of ours. I want to be rid of her and I only have three years left.

  I look down as my phone rings.

  Jarrod.

  “Libby make it home all right?” He asks me. I wonder why in the hell he would ask such a question.

  “She’s home. Why?” I sound irritated and pissed, because I pretty much am.

  “Amalie was worried about her all evening. She said Libby seemed depressed. I noticed it, too. I figured it was because Jackson and Maggie made their announcement and you guys can’t have kids,” he explains. My body stiffens at his words.

  “What?” I try not to yell, but I am confused as fuck.

  “Libby got drunk a few weeks ago and told Amalie that you guys couldn’t have kids. I didn’t know it was a secret. Sorry, man,” he apologizes. I shake my head.

  What the fuck?

  “Uh… yeah, she don’t like to talk about it,” I lie. Holy shit.
r />   “I figured as much, since you all have been married seven years and this was the first I ever heard of it. Amalie and I, we’re here for you, man. If you think about adoption or anything, you can always talk to us, brother,” he offers. I thank him and stare at my phone in disbelief.

  I want to confront Libby. How dare she tell people we can’t have kids. It isn’t anybody’s business what we do or don’t do. Now I am lying to one of my best friends, and she is proving to be nothing but a liar herself. I am so angry. No way can I confront her with the rage flowing through my system. I turn the television off and go to bed. Tomorrow is another day, and one more day closer to my freedom.

  I leave early the next morning for the gym and work out with my team, then practice. I am finished around noon, but I don't want to go home. I can't go home and look into those gorgeous blue eyes—eyes of a liar, eyes that ask me too many fucking questions without her speaking a word. She wants me, she wants a real marriage, but I will never give that to her.

  Everything is fake. I bought into father’s bullshit—hook, line, and sinker. Here I am, living my dream, but I didn’t earn it. I married into it. I hate myself and I hate her equally; but I love her, too, and that pisses me off.

  I walk toward a place I try to never go, but I always cave in. Always.

  “Hey, baby,” she says. Her long dark hair isn’t silk, like Libby’s. She has broken ends. It isn’t soft, either, but feels like straw.

  “Hey,” I grunt when she wraps her body around mine.

  She presses her hard tits against my chest as her big fake lips press against mine. I don’t want her, I want my wife, but I’ll use this girl for now. I move my mouth so her lips miss and landed on my cheek. I can’t kiss her mouth. I never have and I never will.

  I hate that I want my wife. I hate that this woman looks like a cheap knockoff version of my gorgeous Libby. I go inside of her apartment and I fuck her anyway.